By KAREN MIKOLS

Hays Daily News

The Hays City Commission waded around pool issues during Thursday night's work session at City Hall.

Both Wilson Pool and the zero-depth pool at Hays Aquatic Park are leaking, Director of Parks Jeff Boyle told commissioners. The pools each are losing about 2 inches of water each day, which means about 3,500 gallons of water is escaping daily from each pool.

"We've exhausted all of our resources trying to figure out where the leak is at," Boyle said of Wilson pool, which opened mid-summer.

The pool was closed the first part of the summer to try to track down the leak.

"I think we need to bring someone in who does this for a living," he said. "They could probably do it in half the time we could do it, and they will probably actually be able to find the leak."

Commissioners were in favor of spending up to $50,000 to dry up the problem.

"Clearly, if we're the big water conservation poster child, we should not be allowing water to escape," said Vice Mayor Barbara Wasinger.

But she expressed concern about using the same builders to investigate the leaks.

"The problems we had off the bat were the way they were designed," Boyle said. "Every issue we've had is a design issue and was via the architect, not the pool builder."

The commission will take formal action regarding the pools at next week's meeting.

Reporter Karen Mikols can be reached at (785) 628-1081, Ext. 143, or by e-mail at

kmikols@dailynews.net.

Other items discussed

* The city's dog picketing ordinance. The law stipulates a dog should not be tethered for more than one continuous hour.

Police Chief Jim Braun said there have been 35 investigations in the last year -- 29 were taken care of via education. He recommended leaving the ordinance as-is and taking care of concerns on a case-by-case basis.